Author and public intellectual, Gurcharan Das is best known for a trilogy based on the classical Indian ideal of the goals of life. He studied philosophy at Harvard University and was CEO of Procter & Gamble India before he became a full-time writer. He writes a regular column for the Times of India, five Indian language papers, and contributes to international newspapers.

Monday, December 13, 2004

Dhirubhai Ambani’s dreams were born in a one-room chawl in Mumbai’s Kabutarkhana, but they mesmerized the Indian nation for a generation as Reliance Industries went from nothing to become an Rs 100,000 crore petrochemical, energy, and communications giant. The nation watched with awe as Reliance skillfully negotiated the minefields of the License Raj, beat its competitors in the marketplace, and became one of India’s largest and best performing companies. For the past three weeks, however, the same nation has been fearfully worried as this empire threatened to unravel in a soap opera of sibling rivalry.

The first thing to say about this affair is that it is not another failure of corporate governance like Enron. Even though the media has been clamoring on behalf of the small shareholder, there is no case for government intervention. Shareholders have always known that this was a family run company and they ought to have discounted the risk of family trouble in the share price. Besides, Reliance has always treated its shareholders well. There are, however, issues about the opacity in the family’s shareholding, but these are a separate matter, and the bureaucrats at SEBI and Company Affairs ought to relax for the time being.

What then is the problem? I think it is a simple matter of the human ego. Let’s face it--sibling rivalry is the soft underbelly of familial capitalism. Even though Reliance affects millions of lives, there is very little we can do but watch the awesome drama unfold, with horror and pity, like spectators in a Greek tragedy, and learn once again the lesson of the Mahabharata—that it is difficult to be good in this world!

Anil Ambani wrote on December 4th about nishkama karma and the virtue of humility. For two thousand years Indians have been trying to figure out if it is possible for ordinary people to act from a sense of duty, without wanting to take the credit. Self-forgetting is not easy. Most of us can do it for short periods, I think, when we are absorbed in something we like, and then we forget our egos. Artists and athletes in this state talk about losing themselves in the ‘zone’, as indeed Mukesh and Anil must feel when they are absorbed in their work. But what happens after the work is done? Then the nasty little ego asserts itself, and asks, why is my office two inches smaller than his?

I generally don’t read business books, but the Economist recommended Jim Collins’, Good to Great, which has sold 1.5 million copies in hardback, breaking the record set by the 1982 classic, In Search of Excellence, by Tom Peters and Robert Waterman. Collins has identified outstanding companies—defined as those who generated cumulative share returns 7 times better than the general stock market over a 15-year period. One of the secrets of the success of these companies is that their leaders were all self-effacing, modest, and wilful. They sacrificed their personal goals to those of their organization and they did it for love. So, nishkama karma may well be the right way to go for Anil and Mukesh Ambani.

Two weeks ago I raised Draupadi’s dharma question in relation to the bad state of our public governance. The subtext of Draupadi’s question was: in what sense does a wife belong to a husband? In the Ambani’s case, the dharma question is: if you are so proud of Reliance’s professionalism and its ability to compete internationally, then why don’t you control your egos and collaborate? A prolonged legal battle will damage your rightful claim to professionalism.

Monday, December 06, 2004

There will always be rich people and poor, but a good society Aristotle says, is the one “where the middle class is in control and outnumbers both the other classes." Yes, India has its share of billionaires, and a quarter of its people are poor, but the most striking characteristic of today’s India is the explosive growth in the middle class.

For the past 23 years India’s GDP has grown at an average annual 6% real rate, making it one of the fastest growing economies in the world. While slower than China's, it is almost double the growth rate of the previous 30 years, and double the rate at which the West created its Industrial Revolution. As a result, the middle class has more than tripled to 250 million people. While the number of rich has certainly grown, but 1% of the poor have also been crossing the poverty line each year--210 million people over 23 years. The lower castes have risen through the ballot box and seized political power in many states. Thus, pervasive upward mobility may help explain why India is reasonably free of social resentment.

In 1947 when India became free, the nation’s wealth resided with the landed gentry, the zamindars, who lorded over impoverished peasants. There were a few trading and industrial families to be sure--some had avidly supported Mahatma Gandhi and the freedom movement. After independence, the new government took over the princely states and abolished zamindari. The industrial families thought their time had come, but their hopes were short lived. Nehru’s socialist government shackled them with the most stifling controls and tax rates became extortionate. Hence, wealth did not shift from zamindars to the business class, but went instead to finance state enterprises.

With the coming of the reforms in 1991, making money again became respectable, and the old business houses now acquired the esteem that had eluded them. However, socialist controls had so emasculated them that they didn’t how to respond to the new competitive climate. Some joined the Bombay Club and began to clamor for protection; a third just died. But a new group of millionaires took their place. They were professionals, who made their fortunes in IT and the knowledge economy, and they reflect a new social contract of post-reform India where talent, hard work and managerial skill have replaced inherited wealth. Men like Azim Premji and Narayana Murthy are ‘secular ascetics’, who live frugally and engage in philanthropy. Hence, for the first time, the rich are looked up to with pride and reverence.

Indians have not traditionally accorded a high place to making money. The merchant or bania is placed third in the four-caste hierarchy, behind the brahmin and the kshatriya, and only a step ahead of the laboring shudra. Since the economic reforms making money has become increasingly respectable and the sons of brahmins and kshatriyas are getting MBAs and want to become entrepreneurs. India is in the midst of a social revolution rivaled, perhaps, only by the ascent of Japan’s merchant class during the 1868 Meiji Restoration.

Many in the old economy have also done well--Ambanis, Tatas, Aditya Birla group and others have created globally competitive companies. But the nation’s pride is Laxmi Mittal, who has become the world’s largest steel maker. No longer is India Inc run by joint families, and it is resigned to the Indian wisdom, ‘haveli ki umar saath saal’, the life of a business family is sixty years. Accordingly, the first generation makes the money and naturally flaunts it, like Laxmi Mittal. The second doesn’t want more money; it wants power, which might explain Anil Ambani’s curious decision to join politics. Born into money and power, the third generation usually squanders the fortune. Thomas Mann’s wonderful novel, Buddenbrooks, makes the same point.

To return to the point where I began: in any society, the top 15 per cent of the people will do well; the bottom 15 per cent will fail and will need to be looked after. In between is the 70 per cent, which in successful economies becomes the middle class. In India, socialist policies suppressed economic growth and middle class opportunities for decades. Hence, the middle class was barely 8% of the population in 1980, and even now it is only 25%. But if the present rate of growth continues, India should reach Aristotle’s ideal by 2025. Middle class mobility and new meritocratic wealth have made inequality more acceptable--the rich do not excite envy but hope and aspiration.

About Me

Gurcharan Das is an author and thought leader best known for a much-acclaimed trilogy based on the classical Indian goals of the ideal life. India Unbound was on artha, 'material well-being'—the Guardian called it 'a quiet earthquake' – it is available in 19 languages and filmed by the BBC. The second, The Difficulty of Being Good, on dharma or 'moral well-being', is a contemporary meditation on the epic, Mahabharata. Kama: The Riddle of Desire is on the third goal, examining how to cherish desire in order to live a rich, flourishing life.
He studied philosophy at Harvard University and was CEO of Procter & Gamble India before he took early retirement at 50 to become a full-time writer. He writes a regular column for the Times of India and five Indian language papers, and contributes to many international papers. His other books include India Grows at Night: A liberal case for a strong state, which was on the FT's best books for 2013; a novel, A Fine Family; a book of essays, The Elephant Paradigm, and an anthology, Three Plays. He is editing for Penguin a 15 volume history series, The Story of Indian Business. He lives in Delhi.